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I noticed a post on a forum today by a man living in West London who complained about getting a parking ticket for having one wheel on the pavements. His question and the responses nicely present the whole debate and in particular the level of irritation from the pedestrians who suffer!

This is what he said:

“I have just received a parking ticket for parking on the pavement, ticket states ‘parked with 1 or more wheels on any part of an urban road other than a carriageway (footway parking)’. The road was very narrow hence the parking on the pavement & there was no parking restriction signs. I wasn’t the only car parked this way (irrelevant really) but given the width of the road pavement parking seemed sensible if only for access for emergency vehicles, I even folded my wing mirrors back to provide additional clearance (I thought I was being a responsible citizen but there you go).

And here are a sample of the many responses against his position:

“But the pavement is for pedestrians, if its too narrow, park round the corner next time?

“If you can’t leave room for emergency vehicles on the road, then park elsewhere and walk.

“This is the problem with cars getting ever wider – such as the new Mondeo. They may look great in the designers mind but are less practical in the real world.

“Irresponsible pavement parking really bugs me, I will confess I wasn’t always especially careful with the pushchair whilst squeezing past some of the pavement blockers I used to encounter when the kids were small. (and once my daughters arm was quite badly hurt when it got trapped in tiny gap between car and pushchair)

“I am happy you got a parking ticket. When me and my wife walk with our 1 year old son in a pram, we have to risk our life and his to walk in the road because some inconsiderate driver has parked on our pavement! Our child buggy is quite wide and doesn’t fit in the gap most motorist think is suitable.

“As said above, I don’t think the choices are (1) Block the pavement or (2) Block the road. It should be to park somewhere legal, even if it’s further away.

“My nephew is a firefighter – called to a fire in an industrial estate – narrow road where the police had many times asked the local businesses to move the cars. On this day, his senior officer told just “go for it”. he severely damaged 8 cars, and bent the bumper on his Scania fire tuck. The police charged the business in charge of the vehicles parked (a) for parking partially on the pavement, (b) for causing obstruction, and (c) for parking the wrong direction in a one way street.

There were also a few comments supporting the guy though – I particularly liked the suggestion that ‘the government’ should move the disabled, blind, elderly and parents with tripple buggies into ‘special areas’ – I assume he is thinking of ghettos. Nice!

“I don’t hate pavement parkers at all. It’s often the best place to park, sometimes the only one. – And we all know how annoying it is to suddenly get into trouble over something that has always been perfectly all right until that moment… People are going to say: what about the disabled, the blind, the elderly, women with special wide triplet pushchairs… The government should arrange immediately for all such people, and those in similar categories, to live in streets where no one has to park on the pavement. It’s easy when you know how.

“In some places, there are more cars than people who use pavement. So, parking with one set of wheels on pavement is actually better than blocking the traffic flow. It’s a musical chair game. Unfotunately you’ve got caught – so have to pay up.

And his response to all of the above…

“I thought I had a valid point, but it seems the anti-pavement parking brigade want to dominate without any discussion. Shame really.

Clearly though there is a large and pretty motivated ‘anti-pavement parking brigade’ out there as he calls us, and that it really good news for our campaign!

Pedestrians are discriminated against

"In contrast to the changes made to every town and city to ease motor transport, walking has been made ever more unpleasant. Pedestrians have been treated with contempt. In a myriad of ways when we walk we are treated with less respect than when we drive". (quote for a cross-party parliamentary select committee report on walking in towns from 2001).

This blog documents how this discrimination works, what laws underpin it and what people are doing to counter it. Please take action and share your experiences in the comments section, on twitter or join our facebook group. Add photos to the Flickr pool. All photographs cc-by-sa 3.0 unless otherwise stated or obvious from the source.